Yossi Mekelberg

By : Yossi Mekelberg

After taking a short break from signing controversial executive orders, US President Donald Trump was at it again, instructing the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to roll back his predecessor’s Clean Power Plan. In his obsessive drive to undo Barack Obama’s legacy, this time Trump launched an assault on a key policy of at least halting, if not reversing, climate change.

In 2015, Obama and the EPA announced a historic plan to reduce carbon emissions from power plants, requiring states to cut down on their overall emissions. At last, there was a presidential seal of approval from one of the biggest polluters that the way forward was strengthening the trend toward cleaner energy.

As is becoming customary with the nascent Trump presidency, the theater of these executive orders has taken precedence over their substance. On this occasion, as Trump signed the executive order, he surrounded himself with coal miners, whose jobs are supposed to be saved by this act.

There is evidence that for purely economic reasons, the use of coal is declining, and the use of highly polluting fossil fuels contributes to climate change with consequences that threaten the long-term sustainability of the planet. This executive order ignores these two facts.

In his defense, due to his scientific ignorance and crass populism, Trump is consistent and persistent in dismissing the notion of climate change and global warming. He infamously tweeted: “The concept of global warming was created by and for the Chinese in order to make US manufacturing non-competitive.”

Had the US not been one of the two biggest culprits, with China, of releasing greenhouse gas emissions, these comments could have been taken with a wry smile or a nod of the head. However, this man can determine whether the international community will be able to achieve the reduction target in pollution set by the Paris Climate Change Agreement, ratified by Obama only last September.

It has become a recurrent theme in the very short time of the Trump administration that far-reaching decisions are taken that are devoid of political realities, violate international commitments, and are based on very flimsy evidence. Worse, the learning curve is almost non-existent.

The travel ban on a number of Muslim-majority countries has already been overruled twice by federal courts, and the effort to reverse Obama’s Affordable Care Act was rejected by Congress. Yet now comes this attack on efforts to reverse climate change in defiance of clear scientific evidence. According to NASA, 97 percent of scientists specializing in climate change concluded that global warming is human-induced.

There is evidence that for purely economic reasons, the use of coal is declining, and the use of highly polluting fossil fuels contributes to climate change with consequences that threaten the long-term sustainability of the planet. This executive order ignores these two facts.

Yossi Mekelberg

Moreover, according to two leading US science agencies, last year was the hottest year on record. Given that this is the third consecutive year that soaring temperatures have surpassed the previous year’s record, Trump’s flippant approach to climate change should unite the world in concern and condemnation.

Chinese state media has called Trump “selfish” over this irresponsible executive order. Although China is the biggest emitter of greenhouse gases, it signed the Paris Agreement and is in full support of the scientific consensus that climate change is man-made, hence it recognizes that only global cooperation and attention will provide a satisfactory response.

The commitment made by the international community set out a global action plan to put the world on track to avoiding dangerous climate change. The plan aims to limit global warming to well below 2 degrees Celsius, as compared to the temperature level in pre-industrial times. Only by adhering to this target can human misery associated with climate change be averted.

Floods, famine, droughts, extinction of species, decreasing crop yields, and collapse of sea and river defenses represent the threat presented by climate change. Inevitably this will end in human suffering and political instability, including mass migration and even armed conflicts.

It is not only the overwhelming scientific evidence that should have convinced Trump not to sign this provocative executive order; it will not create jobs either. Despite the Clean Power Plan being halted by the Supreme Court, nearly 10,000 jobs in the coal-mining industry have been lost anyway since the courts had their say.

Moreover, according to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics, there has been a constant decline in coal-mining jobs over the last three decades. This derives from the increasing availability and use of natural gas and automation. Similarly, the decision to approve the building of the Keystone XL oil pipeline from Alberta, Canada to Nebraska — which is likely to have a disastrous impact on a fragile ecosystem — will end in marginal job creation.

Market forces will probably dictate that this empty gesture will remain no more than another photo opportunity for a president who craves cheap publicity. But the long-term damage is in his message that the US under his presidency is opting out of combating the global menace of climate change.

Yossi Mekelberg is professor of international relations at Regent’s University London, where he is head of the International Relations and Social Sciences Program. He is also an associate fellow of the MENA Program at Chatham House. He is a regular contributor to the international written and electronic media.

Disclaimer: Views expressed by writers in the Column section are their own and do not reflect RiyadhVision’s point-of-view.

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